1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a plucking-sound generation instrument which sequentially generates one plucking sound or a plurality of plucking sounds at the same time or at predetermined time intervals in accordance with plucking data, and to a plucking-data memory instrument which is capable of storing plucking data at real time or in a step fashion, which plucking data are used to generate plucking sounds to be generated at the same time or at predetermined time intervals.
2. Description of the Related Art
Recently, various electronic musical instruments have been developed which utilize advances made in electronic technology. Among these electronic musical instruments are electronic stringed instruments such as electronic violins, electronic guitars and guitar synthesizers, as well as electronic keyboard instruments such as electronic pianos and electronic organs.
In general, it, as a matter of course, requires strict and time consuming training to adequately master how to play a musical instrument such as a conventional acoustic musical instrument and an electronic musical instrument utilizing electronic technology. A beginner player who plays an unfamiliar instrument for the first time and a player who has not yet been well trained in performance technique of an instrument may usually feel hard to express their intended music through performance of the instrument. Therefore, it will be very useful to provide the beginner players and the not well trained players with a tool which helps these players with expressing their intended music.
One aspect of this kind of tool has been already available as automatic playing instruments in the field of the electronic keyboard instrument. For example, an electronic keyboard instrument is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 4,217,804, which automatically performs arpeggios in accordance with operated-key information supplied from the keyboard and arpeggio-pattern information from the arpeggio-pattern generator. This musical instrument is provided with assignment means for assigning a pitch-order property to each of tone pitches of a plurality of operated keys, and an arpeggio-pattern generator for generating pitch-order properties at the timings when each musical tone is to be generated. The pitch-order property data of the generated arpeggio pattern is decoded referring to the correspondence between the pitch-order property of the operated key and the pitch, thereby forming a pitch representing a particular frequency. Then a musical tone having the decoded pitch is generated. But this instrument does not generate musical tones having pitches other than those specified by the operated keys.
The instrument of the above construction, however, basically has a keyboard of one row pitch or key arrangement and the instrument has been developed with reference to a musical instrument which is operated by motions such as beats and depressions. A musical instrument of a guitar type comprises a fingerboard having a plurality of rows of pitch tracks and is usually played by performing depression operations at the same time or selectively on these pitch tracks. This instrument of a guitar type is extremely different from the instrument of a keyboard type not only in construction but also in performance mode. It will be understood that the techniques employed in the instrument of a keyboard type (as described in U.S. Pat. No. 4,217,804), as they are, are not easily applied to the instrument of a guitar type.
In the field of the electronic stringed instrument, techniques have not been developed adequately for assisting, supporting or helping players who have not been well experienced in playing a stringed instrument. In the instrument disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 4,295,402, even when code-designating operation has been performed partially in error on a fingerboard, appropriate code data are obtained and accompaniment sounds are automatically generated on the basis of the appropriate code data. The technical essence of the invention U.S. Pat. No. 4,295,402 lies in that code designating operation even including error operation produces appropriate code data based upon the electric communication theory relating to signal to noise ratio, and the techniques provides support or assistance for poor or uncertain code designating operation.
High performance techniques in plucking operation with right hand as well as in code designating operation with left hand are required for playing a stringed instrument. There are a variety of plucking-operation modes for example such as (1) down-stroke plucking (hereinafter referred to as "down plucking"), or plucking strings in the direction from a low pitch string to a high pitch string, (2) up-stroke plucking (hereinafter, referred to as "up plucking"), or plucking strings in the direction from a high pitch string to a low pitch string, (3) alternate stroke plucking (hereinafter, referred to as "alternate plucking"), or alternate plucking operation of the down plucking and the up plucking, (4) arpeggio plucking, or plucking particular strings in particular order for dispersed chords, (5) Carter Family plucking and (6) chopper base plucking. It is hard to precisely and firmly perform plucking operations, selecting them from a large variety of these plucking operations during performance of a musical piece.
It is expected by guitar players and, in particular, beginner players that musical tones are obtained by performing only fingering operation on a fingerboard without worrying about complicated plucking operation of strings, which musical tones are similar to those produced when a guitar is played in a normal manner. This means that, to make beginner players advance in playing a guitar in a relatively short time, it is preferable to make the beginner player to pay attention only to fingering operation on a fingerboard by giving help with plucking operation. So it has been long expected a development of an instrument for giving help with plucking operation of stringed instruments.
Advanced performance techniques are required to pluck strings at desired timings and to add accents to the plucking operation. Therefore, it is useful for beginner players to learn timings of plucking operations and how to add accents during the plucking operation, by actually listening to plucking sounds generated by plucking operation performed by a model player. Consequently, it has been expected a development of an instrument which is capable of storing with a high fidelity the state of plucking operation performed by a model player and an instrument which is capable of reproducing with a high fidelity plucking sounds from plucking data obtained by plucking operation performed by a model player.
It is effective for a beginner player to learn how precisely he has performed plucking operations and to immediately find his erroneous plucking operations, so as to make progress in playing techniques of a stringed instrument in a short time. Therefore, it has been waited by beginner players a development of an instrument which is capable of storing with a high fidelity the state of their own plucking operation and an instrument which is capable of reproducing with a high fidelity plucking sounds from the plucking data obtained by his own plucking operation.
Further, in order to learn patterns for a variety of plucking operations and to form patterns other than those of conventional plucking operations, it is necessary for players to store pattern of plucking operations with a simple input manipulation without any restriction. Therefore, it has been expected a development of an instrument which is capable of storing patterns for a variety of plucking operations with a simple input manipulation without any restriction.